Madagascar Vanilla - March 2026

In March 2026, Madagascar vanilla remains in an abundant market

The central issue is no longer product availability, but the international market's ability to absorb volumes that have become too heavy, campaign after campaign.

The signals converge: accumulated stocks, the still high level of the 2025/2026 campaign and buyer caution are keeping lasting pressure on prices. In this context, quality, traceability and stock rotation speed are becoming decisive again.

The current decline no longer looks like a temporary correction. It marks the shift from a tension cycle to an outlet-driven logic, where available supply clearly outweighs immediately absorbable demand.

The sequence of recent years has changed the nature of the market: plantations financed during the high-price years are reaching maturity, while international buyers favor more cautious coverage and more selective purchasing.

As early as March 2025, Malagasy authorities reported a record 2023-2024 campaign of 4,300 t for an estimated global need of around 2,500 t. Three months before the close of the 2024-2025 campaign, only 931 t had been exported, with more than 1,000 t in stock abroad and more than 1,000 t still present locally.

In March 2026, market estimates point to a 2025/2026 campaign of at least 4,500 t. Four months before the new harvest, less than 1,500 t would have left the country, leaving a carryover considered heavy to absorb.

The abundant flowering observed at the end of 2025 also suggests another substantial supply for 2026/2027. The year 2026 therefore looks more like a destocking year than a quick return to price tension.

Main 2024 outlets - indicative shares

International demand is not restarting fast enough to simultaneously absorb old stocks, campaign carryover and new harvests. Available estimates place global absorption at around 2,500 to 3,000 t per year, still insufficient to quickly clear the surplus.

Madagascar's outlets remain highly concentrated, mainly toward France, the United States and Canada. This concentration increases the sensitivity of the Malagasy market to decisions by a few key countries and to coverage choices by major buyers.

• The price correction has not yet produced a clear recovery in purchased volumes.
• Buyers have alternative origins, including Indonesia and Uganda.
• The balance of power does not allow Madagascar to durably impose high prices in an oversupplied context.

Climate risk remains present. Fytia and then Gezani hit Madagascar only days apart in February 2026, causing significant human and material damage, especially on the country's eastern side.

At this stage, nothing confirms a major national shock to the vanilla harvest. However, these events confirm the logistical fragility of a key part of the sector: transport routes, intermediate storage, port access and service continuity.

For operators, the issue is therefore not only agricultural. It is also financial and operational: how long can volumes remain immobilized before weighing on quality, liquidity and purchasing capacity?

Madagascar retains its structural strengths: a recognized Bourbon origin, historical know-how and a central role in the global vanilla trade. But in March 2026, these strengths are temporarily neutralized by the scale of volumes to absorb and by persistent buyer caution.

In this context, the priority is no longer to artificially support prices. It is to make sales flow, improve quality sorting, protect certified and premium channels, and restore commercial discipline suited to a market that has become durably more competitive.

Public data mainly describe the campaign framework and imbalances already visible in 2025. The freshest elements on the current campaign and qualitative segmentation rely more on commercial estimates. They should be interpreted as useful reference points, not final statistics.